Blackstone to build Europe's largest AI data centre in UK

US private equity firm will build the centre in north-east England, which will create 4,000 jobs

A £10 billion investment by US private equity firm in a new artificial intelligence data centre at Blyth, in north east England, will create 4,000 jobs in the UK. Owen Humphreys/PA Wire

Europe's biggest artificial intelligence data centre is to be built in the UK by the US private equity firm Blackstone.

The £10 billion ($13.3 billion) project will be constructed on a derelict site in Blyth, in north-east England. The site had previously been earmarked for a major electric vehicle battery factory, but those plans were scuppered last year when the UK start-up company Britishvolt collapsed, dealing a blow to the country's ambitions of creating a domestic battery industry.

Blackstone's investment was first announced by British prime minister Keir Starmer on a visit to New York this week, and later confirmed by Blackstone's president and chief operating officer, Jon Gray.

"New investment such as the one we've announced with Blackstone today is a huge vote of confidence in the UK and it proves that Britain is back as a major player on the global stage and we're open for business," Mr Starmer said, while Mr Gray added that the UK was ripe for investment "because of its powerful combination of talent and innovation along with a highly transparent legal system".

The AI data centre will create 4,000 jobs, including 1,200 related to its construction. Blackstone will also contribute £110 million to a local fund aimed at boosting skills training and improving transportation in Blyth, the prime minister's office said. Blackstone first proposed building a "hyperscale" data centre on the site in April.

In its second quarter results in July, Blackstone said it was "planting the seeds of future value creation". At the time, the firm's chairman and chief executive, Stephen Schwarzman, said the company was "in the early days of penetrating markets of enormous potential as a key solutions provider to clients and partners globally – particularly through large-scale investments in critical digital and energy infrastructure supporting the artificial intelligence revolution”.

Energy-intensive data centres are a beacon of light for commercial property landlords like Blackstone, as many cities across the world saw office occupancy rates fall in the wake of the Covid pandemic and the increase of home working.

High-level meeting

As part of his trip to New York, Mr Starmer will meet a host of senior US business executives, including Mr Gray, at a round-table event on Thursday. Other executives at the event include Adebayo Ogunlesi of Global Infrastructure Partners, Shemara Wikramanayake of Macquarie Group, Robin Vince of BNY, William Huffman of Nuveen, Brian Moynihan of Bank of America, Carlyle Group's Harvey Schwartz, JPMorgan's Mary Callahan Erdoes, Citigroup's Jane Fraser and Brookfield Asset Management's Hadley Peer Marshall.

The meeting comes ahead of the UK's international investment summit in October, which the government hopes will attract hundreds of leading business figures. However, according to several reports on Thursday, the world's richest man, Elon Musk, has not been invited to the summit following remarks he made on social media predicting civil war in the UK during the unrest and violence that spread across the country in the wake of a stabbing attack in Southport, in which three children attending a dance class were killed.

Mr Musk did attend the AI Summit in the UK last November and had a 'fireside chat' with the then prime minister, Rishi Sunak. The Tesla boss had also visited the UK in previous years and was shown around possible sites to build a gigafactory for electric vehicle batteries. When he subsequently opened such a facility near Berlin, he said Germany had been selected over the UK because of issues arising from Brexit.